


World Domination for Kindergarteners (or, How Not to Raise a Good Citizen)

by speccygeekgrrl



Series: even the mistakes aren't really mistakes at all [1]
Category: Mystery Science Theater 3000
Genre: Awkward teenage Max, Baby mad scientists, Dr. F and Frank try to be good dads, Family Feels, Gen, It doesn't come naturally, Kid Fic, School Shopping, The bizarre little TV's-Forrester family, Tiny klepto Kinga, gratuitous 90s nostalgia items
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-02
Updated: 2017-07-02
Packaged: 2018-11-21 02:59:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,550
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11348466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/speccygeekgrrl/pseuds/speccygeekgrrl
Summary: Kinga is starting school, which means it's time for school shopping. Clayton is not very good at wrangling his daughter. Luckily for him, Max is much better at getting her to behave... Mostly.





	World Domination for Kindergarteners (or, How Not to Raise a Good Citizen)

**Author's Note:**

> Watching the MST3K marathon on Twitch gave me Original Mads feels (so gay! Sooooo gay) but we all know I'm eyebrow deep in my New Mads feels so... Here's both of them!

"Can we go to the arcade?" Max asked as they walked by its open doors, lured by the bright lights and beepy sounds emanating from within.

"Not now," Clayton said, tightening his grip on Kinga's hand when she tried to pull him toward the arcade with all the force her little six-year-old body could muster. "We're here for school shopping. Not playing around."

"But Daddy," Kinga whined, trying again to tug him along where she wanted to go. "I want Max to win me a bear!"

"I won you a bear last time," Max said. "They have other things. A bunny? A duck?"

"A bear," she insisted. "I need more bears."

"Why do you need bears?" Frank asked, and she looked up at him with a bright smile.

"Bears are scary. I can use that." Clayton's brows shot up, and he let go of her hand to ruffle her hair.

"That's my girl." She tried to make a break for the arcade and he caught her by the back of her shirt. "I said not now, Kinga. If you behave we can come back before we leave."

"Okay," she said. He gripped her hand again, and behind her back she crossed the fingers of her free hand. "I can be good." Max bit his lip against a laugh, not knowing what mischief she'd perpetrate but absolutely sure that she wasn't capable of behaving for long.

"Come on, this will be fun," he said instead, coming up on her other side and letting her grab his hand. "You've never been school shopping before. It's exciting."

"I get stuff?"

"You get all kinds of stuff," Frank said. "Shoes and clothes and a backpack..."

"And a bear?"

"Only if you're good," Clayton said sternly. "Bad girls don't get bears."

"Good girls don't take over the world," she said sassily, and Frank stifled a laugh behind his hand.

"She's got you there, Clay."

"You don't need to take over the world, sweetheart. Daddy's taking it over for you. You're going to get it all wrapped up with a pretty green bow."

"I still want my bears."

"I'll get you a bear, I promise," Max said. "Even if I have to come back by myself to get it for you."

"You better," she said, and he squeezed her hand.

"I never lie to you." She beamed up at him and he grinned back at her.

"Shoes first?" Frank said, pointing at the next store they passed, the floor display full of little girls' shoes marked buy one get one.

"Oooh," Kinga said, yanking her hands out of both holds and racing over to the table. "I like these!" She picked up a pair of red high-top sneakers twice as big as her own feet.

"Okay, but we have to find them in your size," Clayton said. "So we should find out what your size is." He pulled her over to a salesperson to get her feet sized. Max hesitated outside the store and Frank paused next to him.

"What's wrong?"

"What if I hit a growth spurt in the middle of the school year?"

"Then you'll get new shoes in the middle of the school year. Don't worry about it, Max. Fit the feet you've got now and we'll take care of that problem when it comes around." He patted his son's back and Max gave him a slight smile. "You need gym shoes and everyday shoes. Go crazy." It was nice having a teenaged kid. Frank remembered the first time he'd taken Max school shopping; it had gotten much easier once Max reached high school and not only didn't need to be observed but preferred not to be. That left Frank free to watch in amusement as Clayton struggled with Kinga, who had all the desire for independence of a teenager before she even started kindergarten.

"I don't want those," she said, crossing her arms and stamping her foot when Clayton showed her the same shoes she'd picked out but in a size that would fit her. "I want the other ones."

"The other ones won't fit you. These will fit you."

"Don't care, I want the other ones!"

" _No_. You're getting these." Kinga took a deep breath and Clayton got a look of sheer panic as she commenced shrieking.

" _I don't want those!_ "

"Kinga, sweetie, calm down--"

" _No!_ " She started tearing boxes of shoes off the shelves and he scowled and puffed up, getting ready to yell back. Max rounded the corner of the aisle, a shoebox tucked under his arm, and knelt down next to Kinga.

"Kinga, look! I found them in my size!" He showed them to her-- bright red high tops with white laces-- and she paused screaming. "We can match, isn't that cool?"

"Y-yeah..."

"But you have to get them in a size that will fit you. If they fall off your feet, we won't match and it won't be cool." He looked up at Clayton expectantly. "Your dad found them in your size, right? You should put them on and I'll put mine on just to make sure they fit."

"Okay," she said, sitting down on the floor in the middle of the boxes she'd pulled down. "I thought bigger was better?"

"Not with shoes," he said. "But definitely with bears."

"Duh with bears," she said, rolling her eyes as she stuck her foot out to get him to take her shoe off. "I need giant bears. Bears as big as you!"

"Bears are much bigger than me," he said solemnly, un-velcroing her sneaker and taking the new one out of the box. "Jeez, Kinga, are you sure you want these sneakers? They've got laces."

"So?"

"If you want to wear shoes with laces, you have to have someone tie them for you."

"Why?"

"Well, you can't tie them yourself, can you?"

"Why not?"

"You don't know how." She rolled her eyes again as he put the shoe on her.

"I can learn. You can teach me, right?" Max looked up at Clayton, who was busy replacing the boxes Kinga had knocked over.

"Your dad can teach you..."

"No, I want you to do it," she insisted.

"I don't know, Kinga, people don't learn how until they're a little older than you."

"People are stupid," she said. "I'm not stupid. I can learn it." At the other end of the aisle, Frank raised his brows at Clayton.

"She's definitely your daughter," he said fondly, and Clayton smirked.

"Mine and no one else's." Kinga sat quietly while Max laced her sneakers up, then tapped her feet on the floor while he put his on.

"See? Stand up." He helped her to her feet. "Walk around with me, we have to make sure they're comfy. You don't want to wear shoes that hurt."

"Okay..." She grabbed his hand as they walked the perimeter of the store and pulled him down to her level. "Max... can you get me two bears?"

"You're very demanding today," he said. "That's gonna take a lot of tickets. I don't think your dad will want to stay here long enough for me to get that many of them. I can only promise you one bear this time."

"But I need a lot of bears." They came around to a wall of backpacks and her eyes went wide as she caught sight of a rack of teddy bear backpacks. "I need _this_ bear!" she cried, reaching for it but too short to get it.

"Oh, I don't know if your dad will say yes to that," he said, but he pulled one off the wall and handed it to her. It wasn't a very big backpack, but it was very soft and friendly looking. "You'd have to be really, really good for him to say yes, and you're already being bad."

"I'm not bad, I'm misunderstood," she said, clutching the backpack to her chest. He pressed a fist to his mouth, barely stifling a laugh.

"Tell him that," he said. "How do the shoes feel?"

"They're good," she said blithely, running away from him to bring the backpack to her father. She flung herself at his legs. "Daddy, Daddy, I found my bag!" Frank took a step back as she went barreling past him, and Clayton wobbled from the force of her colliding with him.

"You did, did you? Let's see it..." She pushed the bag up at him and he mock-frowned at her. "A bear, hmm?"

"I need bears."

"What do you think you're going to do with this bear?"

"Show all the other kids who's boss."

"Oh, how can I say no to that? Of course you can have the bear, honey. But you can't throw anything else around, okay?" He ruffled her hair again and she put up with it for a second before ducking away. "You need more shoes now. One fancy pair, a pair of sneakers, and a casual pair."

"Okay..." She started perusing the boxes on one side of the aisle and he gently turned her to the other side to look. Max came around the corner, red shoes back in their box, the same shoes in black, and a pair of actual gym sneakers in another box, and offered them all to Frank.

"How's these?"

"They look fine to me. You like them?" Max leaned in and lowered his voice.

"I'm not crazy about the red ones, but they'll make Kinga happy..." Frank nodded and answered just as quietly.

"You're already a great Forrester wrangler. Give it twenty years and the pair of you will be unstoppable." Max smiled and walked over behind Kinga.

"Oh, these are really pretty! What do you think?" he asked, pulling down a box from above her sight line. She wrinkled her nose when she saw them.

"Eww, they're pink. You know I hate pink."

"Are you sure? I thought you hated yellow."

"I do hate yellow. They're gross." He pulled down another box to show her.

"What do you think about these?" She clapped her hands at the purple patent leather Mary Janes.

"Those are good!" She sat down on the bench this time, sticking her feet out so he could help her try them on. At the end of the aisle, Frank nudged Clayton with his elbow.

"He's so good at handling her."

"He's better at it than I am," Clayton said wryly. "We staggered them just right, he's a perfect babysitter too."

"Yeah, pretend you did that deliberately," Frank laughed, and Clayton scowled at him. "I know the truth."

"And you'll take it to the grave."

"That and how many other thousands of things?"

"Exactly." It was barely a threat any more at this point; they both knew Frank never stayed dead for long. Kinga came tearing around the corner at full speed, bouncing off of Frank and ricocheting into Clayton only a little less forcefully.

"Found my fancy ones!" she chirped, holding one foot up to display the purple shoes Max had found for her. "They're bad to run in. But they don't pinch. Max said that's important."

"He's right," Frank said. "Ask your dad what happened with the oxblood penny loafers."

"The ones you bought me?" Clayton asked archly, and Frank shrugged.

"Only after you'd been eyeing mine for six months."

"I don't really care," Kinga said, rolling her eyes as she pushed her way between them and went back to the bench. "Max, I want shoes that will make people worried."

"I think you have to wait a few years before you can get those," Max said. "Your feet are growing so fast that you'd just have to replace them soon. But I'm sure your dad will be proud of you when you graduate to big stompy boots."

"That's not fair," Kinga whined, "I want boots now!"

"The only boots in your size are cute ones. Trust me, wait until you're my age to get them."

"But that's _forever_ , you're so old!"

"I'm not that old," Max said, pouting exaggeratedly. "Our dads are way, way older."

"You're older than me twice," Kinga said. "More than that."

"Yeah, but do you know how many times older than you your dad is?" She shook her head and Max shot a glance back at their distracted fathers before he leaned in closer. "He's seven times older than you."

"I don't ever want to get that old. I want to stop before that."

"You... want to die?"

"No, I just want to stop getting old."

"It doesn't work like that," Max said with a laugh, and she huffed impatiently.

"So we'll fix that. We'll have time, right? After Daddy takes over the world? We can do whatever we want to."

"Whatever you want to do, Kinga." He figured he could wait to break the news about her own mortality for a few more years. No reason to nip her mad science daydreams in the bud when who knew what she'd be able to pull off by the time she grew up. She nodded, satisfied with that, and he managed to get her to pick two more pairs of shoes (a blue and white pair of sneakers and a purple pair of plastic galoshes) without any further outbursts. She left the store wearing her bear backpack.

Their next stop was meant to be a clothing store, but between the shoe store and the children's clothing store was a Cinnabon kiosk. Both kids turned near-identical pleading looks on their fathers.

"Do you think you deserve something sweet?" Clayton asked Kinga. She looked thoughtful for a second.

"It can't hurt," she said hopefully. "Maybe it will make me sweeter."

"I think it'll just make you stickier," Frank said. "How about you get it after we're done?"

"But I deserve it now," Max said. "I think I've been good enough for both of us to get one." Kinga added the puppy eyes to her pleading look, and Clayton shook his head.

"You can split one," he said. "The last thing I need is Kinga bouncing off the walls on an icing high."

"I'll keep her in line," Max promised. "She'll be good... right, Kinga?"

"A perfect angel," she said, and Clayton snorted.

"Sweetie, when you lie, if you want to sell it, don't make it too obvious."

"I'll be good until I can't be any more."

"That's believable," Frank said.

"That's honest," Clayton corrected. "We've got to work on your prevarication skills, I think."

"Vacation skills later, cinnamon bun now," Kinga said, and Max laughed. The kids got settled on a bench with their treat, peeling apart the sticky layers with plastic forks and even stickier fingers. There was an Auntie Anne's across the hall from the Cinnabon that drew Frank over, always more a fan of salty snacks than sweet ones, leaving Clayton to keep an eye on the kids while he held all the purchases, feigning indifference but leaning between the kids to steal fragments of cinnamon bun from time to time.

"Uh, Clay, you've got a little..." Frank wiped at his own upper lip to demonstrate, and Clayton rubbed his thumb over his mustache, not doing a great job at getting the smear of icing out of the white streak in his facial hair. Frank licked his thumb and got it for Clayton, who smacked his hand away irritably and then stole part of his pretzel for good measure. Max pretended not to notice the interaction or the hurt on his father's face, focusing instead on getting Kinga's hands as clean as he could with just a handful of napkins.

"What next?" Kinga asked, impatiently putting up with Max's ministrations. "Arcade now?"

"Clothes now," Max said. He cast another glance at their dads-- whose attentions were thoroughly occupied with each other at this point-- and took the initiative on bringing Kinga into the clothing store himself. "What kind of clothes do you want?"

"Purple," Kinga said promptly. "All purple. Or bears. Or purple bears."

"I don't think they have purple bears," Max said. "If you want purple bears you might have to talk to your dad about genetically engineering them."

"He'd do it for me," she chirped, and headed right to the racks of dresses. "Oooh, this is pretty." Max checked the tag in the back of her shirt as she perused the racks, then helped her find her size in the things she particularly liked. By the time their fathers caught up to them, he had an arm full of dresses and she'd moved onto the shirts, determined to find something with a bear on it.

"She knows what she likes," he said as he passed the dresses over to Clayton. "And apparently now what she likes is bears. I have no idea how that got started though."

"I may have an inkling," Clayton said. "I read her a revised version of Goldilocks a few nights ago."

"Revised?" Frank asked.

"I ordered a fairy tale collection from the International Mad Science Parental Association. No morals, no good guy winning, none of that garbage. Just wholesome tales about evil prevailing and dumb getting killed or eaten."

"Sounds horrifying," Max said. "So now she wants an ursine army?"

"She's so ambitious already." Clayton watched her pick through a table of t-shirts with a look of paternal pride. "And clever. She deserves the world and I'm going to make sure she inherits it."

"First she has to get through school," Frank said, and Max shook his head.

"First she has to make it to school," he corrected, "which means she has to get clothes, which means Daddy dearest gets to help her try everything on."

"Oh, joy," Clayton said with a sigh. "Are you sure you can't--"

"I have to get my own clothes," Max said. "She said she'd behave."

"You'll be fine," Frank said blithely. "Max doesn't dilly-dally at the mall. We'll be back in no time." He put an arm around his son's shoulders as they walked out of the store. "He's doomed," he murmured.

"I know." Max couldn't keep a grin off his face. "But he'll be so grateful when we get back. Provided we make it back before she burns the mall to the ground."

"Your instincts are already spot-on. I couldn't be prouder."

In their wake, Kinga bounded over to her father clutching an entire stack of the same t-shirt. "Can I just wear this shirt every day?"

"I don't think so, sweetie. Don't you want these dresses?" He pulled one off the top of the stack and unfolded it to reveal a bright purple shirt with psychedelic panda bears on it. "Dear lord, this looks like an acid trip I had once," he muttered.

"What's an acid trip? Is it about bears?" His eyes widened and he rifled through the stack to find one in her size and pressed the rest of them back into her arms.

"Don't worry about it. Here, put these back where you found them, you can keep one. Did you find anything else you like?"

"Ehh... not really."

"You should get a couple of more shirts and a pair of jeans or something." He followed her back to the table she'd found the t-shirts and picked up a blue one with dachshund puppies on the front. "Oh, how about this one? Max's favorite."

"Daddy... they scare Max."

"Yes, but a good mad scientist always strikes fear into the hearts of her associates."

"He's not my associate, is he? I mean he's bigger than me and older and smarter--"

"I don't know about smarter."

"He's smart," Kinga insisted. "If he was dumb I wouldn't like him."

"Oh, there's something to be said for a dumb second banana."

"No way. I don't want to deal with dummies. Frank messes everything up, Max doesn't do that." Kinga put the shirt back on the table and picked up one with colorful polka dots instead. "This one is okay, I guess."

"Well, how about this? We'll go try these on and get rid of the ones that don't fit well, and then we'll find a pair of pants."

"I'm sure they'll look very pretty on you, Daddy." She grinned up at him, and he laughed and ruffled her hair again.

"My little wisecracker. None of these are my color, but they should look good on you." As they walked to the fitting rooms, they passed a display of accessories, and Kinga slowed down to eye the brightly colored necklaces and butterfly clips. "Later," Clayton said, giving her a little tug to keep her focused. "We'll look at that stuff last."

"Fine..."

"Do you need help trying things on?"

"No! I can do it myself."

"Are you sure?"

"I _said_ I can do it," she said, stamping one foot in a clear warning sign of a building tantrum. He hastily pushed the armful of clothes into her arms and patted her back.

"It's all you, sweetie. Don't forget to come out so I can see how they look." He was glad for the reprieve, honestly, standing by the door and glaring at anyone who looked at him sideways. Every couple of minutes Kinga would emerge in a different dress and do a little twirl, and by the time she'd gone through the stack and discarded about half of them, Frank and Max had come back. "That was fast," Clayton said, and Max shrugged.

"I didn't need a lot of stuff. Everything I got last year still fits. How’s Kinga doing?”

“Max? Are you out there?” she called through the door, then poked her head out and beamed at him. “Look! This one is super pretty.” She came out in a green dress, not Forrester green but more of a mint green that looked very good against her hair. It had a swishy skirt that she spun around to display. “See?”

“Oh, that _is_ pretty. I like that one a lot!”

“Me too! This is the last one, Daddy. Can I look at the jewelry now?”

“Change back into your clothes first,” Clayton said, and she rolled her eyes.

“Duh…” 

“You need jeans, too.”

“I don’t care, pick them for me. I want to look at the shiny things.”

“I’ll keep an eye on her,” Max said. “If you want to go get the jeans now. The faster we’re done, the happier we’ll all be.”

“Fair point,” Clayton said, waiting for Kinga to toss the green dress over the door to add to the pile of things she wanted to keep before he went off to do just that, Frank a couple steps behind him. 

“What did you get?” Kinga asked when she emerged, and Max shrugged.

“A couple of shirts, a pair of corduroys… mostly I just needed new socks.” He tugged on the bear backpack as she bolted past him and she slowed down slightly. “What do you want to look at now?”

“This stuff,” she said, dragging him over to the accessories. She picked up a set of butterfly hair clips and pushed it at him. “I definitely want these!”

“Okay…” She started rummaging through a display of necklaces. There was a display of socks on the other side, so Max went around to poke through that, and Kinga took advantage of his distraction to shove a couple of things into the backpack. A moment later, a bored looking clerk cleared her throat right behind Kinga, and Max looked over to find the woman with her hand around Kinga’s wrist.

“You can’t steal things,” she said, and Kinga’s eyes went wide as the woman reached into the backpack and pulled out a card full of stick-on earrings and a heart necklace broken into two pieces with “best” on one half and “friends” on the other half. 

“I wasn’t,” she said unconvincingly.

“I just saw you,” the woman said. “Don’t lie to me, I saw what you did.” She shook Kinga a little, and Max stepped around the display and grabbed the woman’s wrist right where she’d grabbed Kinga’s.

“You can’t touch her,” he said. “Regardless of what you saw. You can’t put your hands on her.”

“ _You_ can’t put your hands on _me_ ,” the woman said, letting go of Kinga and yanking her wrist from Max’s grip. “Your little sister is a thief.”

“She’s not my sister,” Max said as Kinga hid behind him. “And how do you know she wasn’t just putting it there to ask her dad to pay for it? We didn’t leave the store.”

“Yeah right.” Clayton, unusually sneaky, cleared his throat right behind the clerk and made her jump.

“Is something wrong?” The clerk looked from Clayton to Kinga and Max, then caught sight of Frank, looked puzzled for a moment, then held out the things she’d removed from Kinga’s backpack.

“Your daughter was trying to steal these.”

“Steal? Certainly not,” Clayton said. “My daughter is a perfect angel. I’m sure she was just hanging onto them until I got back to her.”

“It sure looked like she was trying to steal them.”

“Did she leave the store?” The clerk shook her head, and Clayton gave her a pitying look, taking the earrings and necklace from her hands. “It’s highly inappropriate to threaten a small child. I don’t like your attitude, missy. I’d like to be helped by a different clerk when we check out, if it’s all the same to you.” She flushed and turned around, walking off without another word, and Clayton leaned down and held the items in front of Kinga. “Shoplifting already?”

“Apparently not,” she sassed, and he rolled his eyes.

“Kinga, Kinga, where did I go wrong? Shoplifting is always easier in a two person team. Max, I thought you said you would keep an eye on her?”

“I was distracted,” Max said. “And I’m not going to help her shoplift, either.”

“But I got this for you,” Kinga said, holding out the necklace. “See? It’s for both of us.” Max took it, looked down at it, and immediately went misty-eyed.

“Oh, Kinga. You don’t have to steal something to tell me that. I can make us friendship bracelets, okay?”

“You can?” He nodded. “Purple and green?”

“Any colors you want,” he said.

“I think we’re going home now,” Clayton said. “You got one bear, Kinga. That’s all you deserve today.”

“But _Daddy_ , the arcade…” Max put his hand on her shoulder and shook his head.

“The arcade isn’t going anywhere,” Frank said. “Max can win you a bear next time. There’ll always be another bear.”

“Oh, fine,” she sighed. “Next time, though!”

“Max, how about you take the little klepto out to the hall while I buy these things, and on the way home… Chinese buffet for dinner?”

“I want lo mein!” Kinga chirped. Max started guiding her out of the store, and Clayton turned to Frank with a wry expression.

“I’m not so sure about Max,” he said. “He seems… a little too moral.”

“So was I at his age,” Frank said. “Don’t worry, it won’t last.” He nudged Clayton with his elbow and grinned. “We just needed the right bad influence. He’s getting his early.”

“What do you think they’ll accomplish with all the years we didn’t have together?” Clayton asked thoughtfully.

“I have no idea, but I’m looking forward to finding out,” Frank said.


End file.
